PFASs in US food packaging; EU chemical strategy; China's revised new chemical regulation

In this edition of the Chemical Watch Podcast, global managing editor Kate Lowe is joined from Washington DC by North America reporter Jon Kelvey, from Brussels by Europe reporter Kathryn Carlson, and from London by Asia reporter Ellen Daliday.

The podcast starts in the US, where a steady trickle of states have put forward bills to restrict the use in food packaging of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs). We ask whether that trickle, joined last week by Michigan where a bill has been proposed that would ban PFASs and bisphenols from food packaging, could become a flood.

Next, we head to Europe where the much anticipated chemical strategy for sustainability – part of the EU’s Green Deal – is due to be issued on 14th October, but, as a Chemical Watch Global Business Summit heard last week, remains the subject of a final round of "substantial" discussions by European Commission directorates.

And finally we turn to China, where industry specialists have raised concerns that the majority of new substances are going to meet criteria for persistence under the country's revised overarching chemical regulation for new chemicals, MEE Order 12 – and will therefore be subject to increased data requirements laid out in the draft guidance.